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Earth Day - 10 reasons you need to care

It's our responsibility to respect and care for this beautiful place we get to call home. Unfortunately, Earth hasn't been shown enough love and climate change is very real.

Earth Day is a global movement for our planet. More than 1 billion people now participate in Earth Day activities each year, making it the largest civic observance in the world.

How can you help?

The theme of Earth Day 2017 is environmental and climate literacy. Without education, we have no power. This Earth Day the Earth Day Network is encouraging you to gather with your community and attend an environmental and climate literacy teach-in.

Earth Day belongs to you

Each year, millions of you amplify the need for change. Year after year, the movement gets bigger and better. This Saturday we hope no different.

Here are 10 reasons why you should care about Earth Day. Get involved in the day for one of the most important causes - Earth.

10 reasons you need to care

1. Beautiful countries like Greenland are currently disintegrating. If global warming continues cities and even continents could be under water in the near future.

2. With more carbon dioxide becoming trapped in our atmosphere, breathing air may become harder, making humans more prone to respiratory diseases.

3. The severe heat waves we've been experiencing will continue and potentially get worse. Heat-related deaths could rise by 150,000 between 2000-2100.

4. Our seasons could become longer or shorter. Global warming has caused Spring to occur 10 days sooner than previous years.

5. Our stunning coral reefs are suffering due to global warming and pollution. They have experienced the worst bleaching with the highest dying records since 1980.

6. We're losing our fascinating creatures, with more than 1 million species becoming extinct due to dissolved habitats and ecosystems acidic oceans.

7. Our agriculture could be impacted as temperatures rise and crops find survival difficult. This may result in problems for the food processing industry and our economy.

8. If you live by the coast your home or life could be at risk as our sea levels continue to rise. The last 100 years has witnessed sea levels rise more than the past 2000 years combined.

9. With more carbon dioxide in our air and increased temperatures, global warming is encouraging more frequent wildfires, putting our people and planet in serious danger.

10. If global warming progresses, our population could decrease by a massive 75%. Causes of death could be linked to increased severity of natural disasters such as wildfires, earthquakes, floods and storms. Not to mention the risk of starvation, air-related illnesses, and poverty.

These are terrifying facts. Nonetheless, they are real facts. If each of us as individuals don't take immediate action, it will be extremely difficult to prevent our earth from collapsing as a result of global warming.

It's never our style at here TAFE NSW to start the weekend off on a negative note. However, to influence positive action towards change, something needs to be done.